Gauchos Handle Pacific, 79-67 Led by a Career High From LaShay Fears

STOCKTON, Calif. - LaShay Fears scored a career-high 23 points to lead all scorers and Jessica Wilson added 20 as the UC Santa Barbara women's basketball team defeated Pacific 79-67 at the Alex G. Spanos Center Thursday night. A total of four players reached double figures for the Gauchos, who shot an impressive 56% from the field in the win.

With the victory UCSB improves to 16-12 overall this season and remains in the running for the Big West Conference's second seed at 9-4. Pacific, who lost for the fifth consecutive time, falls to 8-20 overall and 2-11 in league play. The Gauchos will play Cal State Northridge with second place on the line Saturday afternoon at 4:00 p.m. following the Matadors 67-60 defeat of Cal Poly in Northridge Thursday night. The win snapped the Mustangs eight-game winning streak.

Fears, who led the Gauchos in scoring for the second consecutive game and third time overall this season, shot 6-for-10 from the floor, including 3-of-5 from three-point range, and made all eight of her free-throws for a career-best 23 points. Her previous best was 20 that came at Cal Poly February 4, 2006. The Palmdale, Calif. native added a game-high six assists, which was one off her personal best, only had one turnover, and grabbed three rebounds.

With a host of her family in attendance, Wilson had a brilliant game from the field, finishing 7-of-10 for 20 points. She made all three of her attempts from distance, hauled in a game-high 10 rebounds, and had three steals. The native of Sacramento now has three double-doubles this season. Jenna Green bounced back from an off performance against UC Riverside, tallying 14 points on 6-for-10 shooting, to go with six rebounds, and five blocks and Chisa Ononiwu went 4-of-6 from the field and finished with 10 points to round out the Gaucho scoring leaders.

After a slow start, UCSB built an 18-6 lead following a Fears jumper at the 8:23 mark. The Tigers responded with six treys in the next four minutes - all by Kelly and Roberts - to take a two-point lead at 26-24 with 4:33 left in the half. Fears answered with a triple of her own and Jordan Franey scored on a beautiful pass from Wilson to take the lead back 29-26 with 3:17 to play. Pacific would pull within one again, but Santa Barbara got another three from Wilson and a Green layup with two seconds remaining gave the Gauchos a 36-32 lead at the break.

UCSB opened the second half on a 17-4 run keyed by four points from Ononiwu to take its biggest lead of the game, 53-36, with 12:31 left to play. Trailing by 17 again at 59-42, the Tigers got hot from distance again and pulled to within six (59-53) following a triple from Kelly, two from Lavender, and a Dawkins layup. The Gauchos then scored seven of the next nine points to build a 66-55 lead with 4:22 left on the clock.

UOP would get no closer than eight the rest of the way and UCSB held on for the 79-67 victory.

After shooting a season-high 58.5% from the field in their January 27 meeting with the Tigers, the Gauchos made 28-of-50 shots from the floor Thursday, 56%. Pacific shot 40.7%, connecting on 24-of-59 shots. Despite allowing 11 offensive rebounds, UCSB posted a 31-28 advantage on the glass and outscored UOP 34-20 in the paint.